I’m idly wondering what effect, if any, the many decades of enthusiastic oil extraction in the region has been having on its geological stability; so I google for “earthquake” in the news and discover that there have also been Richter magnitude 5 or greater earthquakes near Wellington, the Kermadec Islands (which are also NZ, hit four times in the last week including a Richter 6.4 strike), Fiji (twice), Lake Tanganyika (Congo/Tanzania), Romania, Southeastern Siberia, Komandorskiye Ostrova (Russia), Japan, the Phillipines, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea (twice: one near Lei, one near Rabaul), the Solomon Islands, the Andreanof Islands, the Timor Sea and the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (twice) in the last week, which is about 30% high compared with the expected ≅800 a year. Not dramatic, probably still well within the bell curve, but I’ll keep watching.

Richter 7 quakes (such as the previous one to hit Pakistan) are expected to hit ≅18 times a year.

Penguinista Archive

Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

Who is Leon?

John Tukey

Better to havean approximate answerto the right questionthan a precise answerto the wrong question.

Bernard Shaw

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world;the unreasonable one persists in tryingto adapt the world to himself.Therefore all progress dependson the unreasonable man.

Albert Einstein

It is nothing short of a miraclethat modern methods of instructionhave not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry.For this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation,stands mainly in need of freedom.